Night-Gaunts and Other Tales of Suspense Read online

  This room in darkness, this bed with its lumpy and stained mattress was a special place for me, and for Mrs. S___ who dwelt in the shadows here, though not in the daylight—you could not have detected Mrs. S___ in the daylight. (And so my mother could have no idea. For always I removed my soiled bedclothes from my bed and stuffed them into the washing machine before my mother could change the bedclothes once a week on Monday mornings and so accustomed had Ma become to this routine, she rarely entered my room, at least so far as I knew, and our secret was unspoken between us.)

  Woman’s body. Woman’s body. Hours passed and I did not move for I was feeling a strange dizzy sickness and then when I tried to stand, this sensation deepened, the way you sometimes feel after being in a boat, a rocking boat, in turbulent water, and when you step out of the boat and onto land you feel suddenly nauseated—seasick on the land because it is so still.

  Though at the lumberyard I was one of the strongest workers a terrible weakness suffused me as I reached for a light switch, my legs gave way and I fell, hard … Then, my parents were in the room crying out to me frightened as I had not ever seen my father asking what was wrong, what had happened to me, and when I could sit up, and when I could speak (for my mouth was so dry, it was as if I had swallowed sand) I told them that I was the person who had killed Mrs. S____—“I was there, that was me. Hid her in the wall where nobody was supposed to find her.”

  This would be a part of my life like a sickness that begins with fever, chills, nausea so strong that, even when the worst of the sickness has passed, the memory of that time will always be the worst of the sickness, and not what comes after.

  For days then they would question me—“interview” they called it.

  At police headquarters where some of the officers knew the name “Heike” and were respectful of my father who’d brought me in and remained with me for most of the time.

  Did Pa believe that I was the murderer of Mrs. S_____, I did not know. Did Ma believe?—yes, I think so.

  (Past 11 P.M. of the night of my confession Pa drove me to the police headquarters leaving my stunned mother at home. For things were so upset, it was believed better for him to get me out of the house as soon as possible.)

  In a stammer I tried to answer questions put to me. Why had I killed the woman, how many days ago had I killed the woman, how did I know the woman, had the woman invited me into her house, what had I done with the knife? And the ransacked house—what had I stolen? It was like Sunday school, being asked questions and everyone staring at my mouth and out of my mouth came—what? Words like phlegm to be coughed up, spat out. Words that were not my choice for I could not think clearly, my head was stopped with greenish phlegm that was disgusting to me and also to the men who stared at me as they might stare at a rabid animal.

  It was a bright-lit room. Fluorescent lighting that hummed and crackled. The eldest of the police officers (who had known my father since they’d been boys, and was a “detective”) spoke kindly to me, patiently, but over and over the same questions were asked, that I could not answer definitely for I could not seem to calculate what answers were “right”—what answers were expected.

  How many days ago had I killed Mrs. S____—I had no idea.

  Why had I killed Mrs. S____—I had no idea.

  (Because she was mocking to me?—because I hated her?—this was too weak an answer to seem believable to adult men, from a husky boy like me. Too shameful.)

  (It had turned out that Mrs. S___ had also taught elementary school for years. But that she had taken “early retirement” just the previous year. Her husband had worked at the New York Central railroad yard but he’d retired also with a disability.)

  Had I had a “relationship” with Mrs. S_____?—shook my head no.

  Had I had a “sex-relationship” with Mrs. S_____?—shook my head no! (This was very disgusting to me and shameful, with Pa right there listening. Could not even meet Pa’s eyes.)

  What had I done with the knife?

  I said, in the creek …

  The words came to me. Clumsily my tongue moved. I had thrown the knife into the creek, I told them. For suddenly that was obvious.

  Where in the creek? Near where?

  This, I could not recall clearly. My brain hummed and crackled and I could not hear what I meant to say.

  In a police car they drove me along the creek roads. Both sides of the creek. Mostly there was underbrush and no paths leading to the creek except where people lived, where it was not likely that I had gone to throw the knife into the creek. For an hour and more, we drove along the creek, crossing at the Mercyville Bridge to return, until finally it occurred to me—I must have thrown the knife into the creek from a bridge …

  Of three or four bridges in the vicinity all were well known to me. It was believable that I would have thrown the knife into the creek from the Firth Street Bridge which was not so far from Cottage Street, and so I told the detective this, and in the police car we drove to Firth Street but when we parked and walked out onto the bridge (a plank bridge, slick with wet, and the dirt-colored water below like sludge, tree limbs and trash rushing past so it made me dizzy) I told them that I was not sure which side of the bridge it was, I could not remember. The depth of the creek was twelve, fifteen feet below the bridge. At this time of year the current was swift. A terrible roaring rose in my ears from the creek which I could glimpse through the planks. I could not hear a word put to me even by Pa who stood close beside me touching my arm as if to comfort me, or restrain me from climbing over the bridge railing though at that moment I had not made the slightest motion to do such a thing though later it would occur to me, when I was back in the interview room like a body trapped in a vise.

  Was I sure there was a knife? Was I sure that it was a knife I had thrown into the water?

  This was a trick question, I thought. For the men were doubtful of me.

  But then, it seemed to me that the East Street Bridge was more likely for that bridge was on my way home if I had my bike, that was where I must have tossed the knife.

  But when they took me to the East Street Bridge, again I was not sure. Began to stammer and they saw the confusion in my face and were not so patient with me.

  Almost I could hear them—Jesus Christ, How-ard! What the hell is wrong with you!

  From the start Pa had been telling them he did not believe that I had murdered that woman Mrs. S_____. He did not believe it. When had it happened?—how many days ago? I had been home every night, he said. And after school, I worked at Heike Lumber.

  The corpse had begun to decompose inside the wall, it was said. The coroner had not yet determined how long for the weather had been cool, it was November and rainy, and that would preserve the corpse longer than in warmer weather… . I did not want to think of this. My Sunday school teacher rotting.

  Yet it was fascinating to me, that Mrs. S___ who had so teased and tormented me and dared to touch me with her fingers light and quick as a daddy longlegs was now just a corpse. Men would examine this corpse with instruments, I supposed. An autopsy would mean sawing through the chest and rib cage and that place between the legs that was rimmed with wiry hairs.

  I had not ever seen that part of Mrs. S_____. But I had felt it, the stiff-wiry hairs on my fingers and against my tongue.

  My son would never harm another person, Pa was saying. His voice strange and hollow like the voice of one standing in a deep well.

  Insisting that I had not behaved strangely or any different than usual. Not ever!

  Insisting that I had never hurt anyone, that he knew about. If I had been in trouble at school it had been caused by other boys picking on me, of course I’d had to fight back.

  A few times, I’d been sent home from school for fighting. But I had not been expelled as other boys had been expelled including boys who were my friends.

  How many fights? What kind of fights? Had anyone been seriously injured?

  No! No.

  (I’d wanted to protes
t to the police officers that son of a bitches had thrown stones at me after school plenty of times. Actual rocks. Bricks. I’d been hit by a piece of brick on my forehead, scar in my right eyebrow never went away. But no, this had not been reported. There was no record with police or at the school. Nobody gave a damn about me, if I was hurt.)

  The most embarrassing thing was, Ma was interviewed also. Not in my hearing, but Pa related to me what she’d said to the police. Somehow I had not thought that my parents would be questioned if I confessed, I had not thought about the consequences at all. My mother was emotional insisting that I had not murdered Mrs. S_____. All she did now was cry and pray, and pray and cry. God had assured her that she would have noticed bloodstained clothes in the laundry if her son had murdered anybody. She would have noticed “strange behavior.”

  Ma could not ever speak of Mrs. S___ without breaking down and crying in a helpless way like a baby, and her face crumpling like a cake left out in the rain. The police officers were sorry for her at first but then embarrassed and annoyed by her for they considered her testimony “next to worthless.” (As Pa told me.)

  During the days of questions it was not always clear to me what was happening. It was not like TV crime programs—very different from these as there was no ending to anything, questions were repeated and nothing seemed to be concluded. Many times I explained to the police officers that I was the one, I had killed Mrs. S___ yet still they did not seem to understand.

  Why did you kill the woman?—tell us.

  Because I wanted to rob her house.

  Rob her house. But what had I taken from her house? What was missing? Money from her purse? Pieces of jewelry wrapped in velvet cloth in a bureau drawer? The little gold cross on a chain I’d have liked to tear off the woman’s neck leaving a raw red laceration in the white skin?

  And why had I dragged her body into the storage space? How had I even known that the space was there?

  This was a strange question to me. It was perplexing what answer they wanted. (Though later it would be divulged that the storage space was behind a cupboard door behind furniture shoved against a wall with just enough space left to open the door a few inches.)

  Later it occurred to me, maybe I had not thrown the knife into the creek. So far as I knew the police might have been looking in the creek by the bridges (though no one had told me that they had) but they had not found the knife, or any knife (so far as I knew). Maybe I had tossed the knife into a ravine instead. Into a landfill—there was a landfill on Horse Farm Road where we rode our bikes. Maybe I had buried it under trash where we searched for treasure in the landfill. If I shut my eyes (so tired, my eyes would shut by themselves) I would see suddenly sharp as a picture on TV news where I had buried the knife—a clean sharp blade glittering in the dirt.

  But where did you get the knife, Howard?—so they asked me.

  I guess—it was there. In her kitchen.

  It was there? In the woman’s kitchen? How did you know it would be there?

  This was a nonsensical question. I wondered if it was a trick question. For of course there would be a knife in a kitchen, there could not be a kitchen without a knife. Why were they asking me such questions.

  I told them all that I knew: the knife had belonged to Mrs. S_____.

  And what kind of knife was it? A long knife, a shorter knife, a bread knife—?

  A long knife, I said. A steak knife.

  Ah, a steak knife. You know what a steak knife is?

  I thought that I did, yes. Or was I thinking of a carving knife, that Pa used to carve turkeys and hams.

  When I stammered answers to their questions they glanced at one another. The room was so bright with fluorescent lighting I could not decipher what messages or signals they were sending to one another.

  So many times asking me did you murder the woman because you knew her or because you just wanted to rob her. But why did you choose that house to enter, of houses in the neighborhood where no one was home?

  You stole from the woman’s purse, you took things from her—what did you take?

  I said, I took money. I took dollar bills.

  Not change?

  Not change. I took dollar bills.

  And where did you put these dollar bills?

  In my pocket. Pockets.

  Which pockets?

  My jacket.

  Which jacket?

  Corduroy …

  How many, Howard?

  How many—what?

  Bills. Dollar bills.

  I—don’t know. I didn’t count them just put them in my pocket …

  And what did you do with these dollar bills, Howard? Do you still have them?

  N-No …

  Did you spend them?

  Yah I guess so …

  Where? What did you buy?

  All I could think of was the 7-Eleven store where we hung out after school. From younger kids I knew who were kind of afraid of me, I could get money, a few dimes and quarters just enough for a Coke. And that afternoon Mrs. S___ came out of the store carrying the plastic bags.

  Ma’am c’n I help you.

  And her looking at me.

  And her red mouth, opened in surprise.

  In the night sometimes she’d said to me opening the door of her car OK, How-ard. Get in.

  Get in, we’re going for a ride.

  Fucking ride, How-ard. D’you know what fucking is?

  Between my legs it was hard as a Coke bottle. Tears started from my eyes, the sensation came so fast and could not be stopped.

  All the dollar bills are gone, Howard? Is that what you are saying?

  Yah. I guess.

  What did you buy, Howard? Can you itemize?

  But I could not answer. To tell them a Coke, a bag of corn chips, to play Death Raider with some other guys was a pitiful reply.

  In the lavatory emptying my guts into the toilet. Hot-scalding guts. Then washing my hands until the skin was raw. Filthy boy we know what is in your heart.

  Picking at the ugly blemish on my cheek, trying to loosen it. For it seemed to me that the sign of the beast had gotten larger, like a pimple or a boil that might come to a head.

  In the lavatory mirror there was a kind of film, like grime or mist. It was not possible to see my face clearly even the birthmark, that I was scratching with my nails.

  Howard?—just wondering where you were, son.

  Yah. I’m here. Where else’d I be?

  Yet they did not arrest me. A day and a night and another day. Asked the same questions over and over to wear me down I supposed but since I had already confessed I did not understand this.

  Pa was exhausted for (he said) he could not sleep at all, at night. Could not even lie in bed unless he drank one beer after another and even then, his nerves were not steadied. My mother had gone to stay with one of her sisters, she could not bear to remain in the house alone when Pa was at police headquarters. Pa had not gone to work at Heike Lumber since the night he’d driven me to the police.

  On our front lawn garbage was dumped. Who did this would never be known.

  By now everybody in Bordentown knew. News had been released, that the fifteen-year-old son of local parents, a ninth-grade student at the high school, had been taken into custody by Borderntown police.

  Taken into custody was not the same as arrested.

  Interview was not the same as interrogation.

  When would I be arrested, I was eager to know. I hoped that it would be soon so that I did not have to return to school.

  Some of the relatives were saying, Pa should hire a lawyer for me. Pa said that was easy for them to say, the sons of bitches wouldn’t be the ones paying.

  Pa said he could not afford a lawyer. Ma said if we hired a lawyer it would look as if my parents thought I was guilty.

  Another police detective came to interview me, from the State Police in Albany. This detective’s questions were like the others but there were further questions I had never heard before, and could n
ot think how to answer.

  Was I confessing to this crime, the detective asked, fixing me with cold blue eyes like I was an insect, under coercion?

  Under coercion. I was not sure what this meant but supposed it meant that someone was making me do it.

  No, I said. I was not.

  You are not covering up for someone else, are you? Someone in your family?

  N-No …

  Did you know that your father had often been in the S___ house? Did you know that your father and the woman S___ knew each other well?

  Was this so? Or was the detective lying, to trap me? Staring at me like he was so much smarter than me but the son of a bitch was not.

  I was very tired now. I wanted only to sleep and could have slept on the floor of the interview room that was dirty and stained with muddy footprints.

  Then later, when the State Police detective asked again about coercion, I began crying. It was a surprise to me (as to him) but I could not stop.

  Heaving sobs that made my chest ache. It was not that I believed what the State Police detective had said about my father for I did not believe him, but rather that such words might be said, and heard by others, and not ever erased from their hearing.

  Not the son but the father. The real murderer!

  It was allowed then, I could lay my head down on my arms in the interview room. At once there came Mrs. S___ toward me with a red moist smile. Her waist was cinched tight by the black patent leather belt. Her bosom jutted out like actual fists. The little gold cross glittered against her white skin. Her fingernails were polished to match her lips and her hands opened to me, to touch, and to tickle. But the floorboards broke beneath her feet, the rotted planks collapsed. Her red mouth opened like a wound—Oh How-ard!—but she did not scream loud enough to be heard by anyone else.

  Fell into the collapsed plank floor and was lost to me.

  A door was opened at my back. They had brought Pa with them. Loud voices woke me.